Random Pet Challenge [v3.0]

[Lupis]

*Grins* I'm just a creepy person I guess.

Woo, Shadowclaw! By the by, I might just do a visual review for this one, because I've done a LOT of cat reviews. xD

[TygerDarkstorm]

*Grins* I'm just a creepy person I guess.

Woo, Shadowclaw! By the by, I might just do a visual review for this one, because I've done a LOT of cat reviews. xD

Copy/paste is your friend. I do it all the time for all the reviews of the same species. Or with some of my reports, like Sambas' I just leave those areas less detailed. It starts becoming routine with the information. XD

[Daranara]

We're back with another edition of....!

WHO'S THAT POKEMON?



It's..... MADEXX!



"Chrrchrrssktchrrrtrll!"

....*cough*

Anywho! Madexx is one of the new tameable rare spawns given to us by the Cataclysm. Madexx lives in the desert sands of Uldum, and is unique in two one ways! He USED to be unique in that he was the only scorpid that had his model (which is that of the horde guild scorpid mount! A bonus for those of you who like to match your mounts with your pets!), but with the addition of the venomscale spitters you now have an option for this model in brown.

What ACTUALLY makes Madexx unique is that he has five distinct colors that can spawn in any of his spawn points: black, blue, bronze, green, and red. For the purposes of this review, I am going to be telling you about the black version of Madexx.

Any talk of Madexx, however, must be prefaced with talk of the camp for Madexx. While you might get lucky, it's true, you must be prepared for the prospect of spending hours, days, even months looking for this beastie.

On my hunt for him, I spent my days communing with the avatar of P. Dawg...



...and my nights burning in Deathwing's flames. No fewer than twice!



It was not until I had the help of the tireless Furiku (from these forums!), without whom I may very well still be circling, that Madexx saw fit to show himself to us:



And that, gentle readers, brings us up to speed with Moonseeker, the black Madexx.



Let us discuss some specifics about his looks, shall we? Let's have a look in a better light!



As you can see here, "black" Madexx isn't so much black as he is a nice warm grey color, with deep red details. He is highlighted and has details in a dull gold color, making him much more varied in color than some may think.



From the side we get a good idea of how his various chitinous plates fit together, down his back and along his tail to his red stinger, tipped in a bright purple color.



From behind, we see no surprises or hidden colors, as the undersides of his plates are simply a dark grey. You can also see one of his idle animations from the back.

Speaking of, he has two of them. When standing still, he is either steadily going click, click, click with is claws while shifting his weight from side to side, or he is doing the now-famous scorpid "wheeee it's good to be alive!" claw wave, as pictured above.

Walking with Madexx shows his steady, slightly bouncing gait. His walking legs scurry along quickly, while his pincers and tail bob along rhythmically. It's pretty fitting, and I find it kind of cute.



When he idles while swimming, he allows his legs to dangle below him, kicking softly, while he waves his claws around steadily. His swimming is... smooth, at least. I'll admit, I'm not entirely certain what part of this motion would be great at propelling him along, but...

Here, just watch it.



As far as combat animations go, he has two: A left pinch and a right pinch.


"Take that!"


"and THAT!"

There is no evidence of using his stinger at all, which is kind of a shame.

As far as usefulness in combat, I think he's pretty good. He's a champion tank, as is expected of a tenacity pet. His special is a disarm, which I figure is probably more pvp-oriented, but it's fun when I go solo Skadi for his mount for lolwhirlwind fun.

OVERALL

PROS:
- well put together model!
- 4/5 unique colors!
- different than the other scorpids!
- non-exotic, so all our hunter friends can have one!

CONS:
- lives in a crowded area, so competition can be fierce.
- getting the color you want can be a pain.

Getting your very own Madexx is an exercise in frustration and patience, especially if you have your heart set on a certain color, and that particular color insists on being coy. If you're going for it, I suggest bringing friends. His area is kind of big, and with so many people swarming around it most of the time it is possible (if you are terribly unlucky) to have him spawn at the end of the area that you've just left, have someone pounce on him for taming, and be off again before you return. Bringing friends gives you more eyes on the area and a better chance that the one pouncing on your scorpid is... well, you.

Is he worth it? Well I, for one, was never attached to any of the other scorpid models/colors, so this one if best for me. With the introduction of the venomscale spitters, it's easier than ever to try to get a feel for the model before you commit to the hunt. If you're curious, I might suggest giving one a whirl, just to see.

In short: if you like scorpids, it's good. If you like tenacity pets, it's good. If you like disarming people, it's good. If you like the thrill of the hunt... well, may P. Dawg be merciful on your soul. By which I mean it can be good, if long and lonely.

It's time to say goodbye, Moonseeker!



I don't know which of these is more fun, doing the taming of the randoms, or being able to natter on about the babies I already have! That said, may I have another? The usual info applies, rare reviews are perfectly fine (with strikes being the ones I have already done):

Daranara
level 85
exotics okee!
no restrictions!
Rares I Have: Loque, Skoll, Arcturis, Gondria, Karoma, Ghostcrawler, Krush, Sambas, Jadefang, Madexx (black), Olm, Lord Kri

[Lupis]

Shadowclaw report. (Not doing that much for this, sorry. I have a headache from hell. >.<)

For Alliance, Shadowclaw is easy to find and tame. He's low enough in level that he spawns in 30 minutes, making him a very common sight to see. For Horde, it's a bit tougher. You need to get pretty far into Darkshore to get him. However, I tamed him with a flying mount, so all was easy.

I'm.... just going to describe his model and skin, because I'm just that lazy.
I really like the Sabercat model. They're a heavy-set cat, with big strong shoulders and a long face. Unlike normal cats, they don't have a fat nose or weird brow. They do have the same leg problems, though, and I've come to realize that their tails are way too short.
The skin isn't my favorite. I like the colors and pattern in general, though.



His face is sort of love-hate for me. I love his pretty eyes, and how shiny his fur is. At the same time, I hate how dirty he looks, and his teeth are an overly bright orange. He needs a toothbrush.



His body and legs have fur drawn on, but it looks somehow matted and dirty, like he hasn't had a bath in years. See all those little lines?
What I do like, though, are the stripes. They're bright silver at his spine, and turn black as they go down. They look a little fake, as they're way shinier than the rest of his fur, but I still think it's pretty.



(Back detail)


Personally, I think he looks best in the shadows, as his name announces. Look at the unlit side of him...



Strangely, I think this cat looks a hundred times better in motion. I can't capture that in screenshots, but I can try.







I don't know why I think that, but I do. He looks beautiful in motion, while standing still his skin bugs me a bit.

(That's it, sorry. If you want to see their animations, I have plenty of cat reports already posted! Sorry for being lazy, head = death.)

Anyway. Another please? Oh, and I'll be doing two.
First: Vallrok
82 BM
Exotics? Sure
Restrictions: No monkeys. Gorillas are okay.
Rares I Have: Skoll(Reported on), Gondria, Loque'nahak, Arcturis, Duskstalker, Shadowclaw(Reported on), Rak'shiri, Pogeyan

And, a rare-only report for Rassaa.
Rassaa
85 BM
Rares I Have: Karoma, Terrorpene, Zaricotl, Spiteflayer(Reported on), Ghostcrawler, King Krush, Sambas, Madexx(Green), Madexx(Black), Jadefang, Deathmaw, Olm

[Airwyn]

Ok I wanna join


Airwyn
Level 85
Exotics: Yes
No restrictions
Rares I have: Karoma, Sambas, Terrorpene, Madexx (blue), Madexx (red), Arcturis, Gondria, Jadefang, Ghostcrawler, Ashtail, Aotona, Loque'Nahak, Skoll, Lord Condar, and Ainamiss the Hive Queen.

[Belleirle]

Sorry for the really late report, this week was kinda crazy for me.
My Report on the Color Changing Dog .

Looking for my next Doggie, I took the portal to Twilight Highlands and flew off for the long journey to Gilneas. I found one at the waterside and set a trap while it was running around. She walked right into the trap and became a easily tamable pupsicle. After a few moments of thought, I decided to name her Brandy, after a dog my family had when I was really young.


I love the pet dogs. I think real life mastiffs and large drooly dogs are so cute and adore them, and it transferred to the game ones. The models are really nice except for some kinda glaring flaws. Those being that they are very low res, which is a real shame, since they could look so much better. Also, Brandy's elbow seems to be either a spike, or clipping though part of her chest so it just looks like a spike. Also, my color changing doggie never changed color over the past few days, even though I tried by dismissing and calling her back out. She stayed her gray color the whole time. I'm not sure if they no longer change color or if brandy never felt like doing the trick for me. The gray skin is a nice color though too. I love all the colors of them brandy had blue eyes that aren't too well done, making her looks like she has cataracts. They have the large drool flaps that are also lacking detail. I think the expression that the dogs have their face is gruff, but loyal.



Brandy's animations aren't too bad. While idling, she will wag her tail a little, and occasionally shake her head to the side, which makes her jowls fly around. Her running animation is her barreling along side you, trying to keep up. She falls behind a bit, and then charges forward before slowing down next to you, and the cycle repeats. Her swimming animation is sadly her slow walk animation instead of a doggy paddle. Her slow walk animation is almost like a prance, but not quite. She is quiet while idling, making no noise that I heard.



When it comes to fighting, Brandy is a great dps, partially because she's a ferocity pet. She was a good tank for a ferocity pet when her special ability, Lockjaw, is turned off. Lockjaw is a channeled pin that dogs will do to their targets. Lockjaw would be more useful if the pet wasn't the main target for the mob, so perhaps for pvp or groups. When fighting, the dogs regularly made loud barky-snarl-chomp sounds, which might be too loud for some people, although I didn't mind too much. Brandy's fighting animations were mostly a bite where they turn their heads a bit and kinda crouch down some.


It was great getting another pooch for my stables, which I will keep even though I have my brown dog, Spuds, already. I just absolutely love the cutesy poochies

And another roll please
Name: Belleirle
Level: 85
Exotics: yes
Restrictions: No more beetles please
Rares I have: Jadefang, Sambas, Ghostcrawler, Mazzranache, Deathmaw, and Bjarn.

[TygerDarkstorm]

So I totally forgot that Venjin made a report on the undead eagles in the Theme Challenge so I'm copying her report over to here:

Meet Tony the undead hawk.


First, I'll explain Tony's name a bit. When I first showed my boyfriend this pet, he said "that looks like the symbol Tony Hawk uses." I forgot about it and asked him what I should name this guy, and he reminded me of our discussion. And thus is how Tony earned his name. =P
Secondly, these guys are available via quest line in Western Plaguelands--there's one pre-quest to it to kill 20 diseased animals; nothing real hard. And they are now available in Zul'Drak and Icecrown.

On to looks. I was surprised to find myself pretty impressed with this guy looks wise. The model is actually really well done and looks to be in decent quality.


His vertebrae sticking out of his back made me go "O_o" at first, but doesn't creep me out enough that I wouldn't tame this guy. Like I said, it's a pretty solid looking model with some really nice touches on it. His face and feet have no skin on them. What feathers he does have are a neat greyish-brown color and he has bandages wrapped around his body (to hold it together I guess).

These guy have animations pretty standard to the bird families. They flap in place (next to your shoulder thankfully and not by your feet), they fight with their beaks and claws. The noises they make are pretty cool, very fitting to an undead bird I think. Also, they do perform trick! ^_^

Their ability, snatch, can actually come in very handy in both PvE and PvP. Disarming a hard hitting mob in PvE will make both a healer's life easier in a dungeon, and make your life easier soloing (less healing on the pet). The bright side is that with Grace of the Mantis, cunning pets can even function as pseudo tanks (and perform quite well at it actually). Disarming unsuspecting melee in PvP is also fun as well, and PvP is probably where these guys shine the best.

Green plague hound report soon.

[Kormai]

Meet Tony the undead hawk.

I actually facepalmed...

I'll edit this/post again with rolls in a bit! Need food.

EDIT

Daranara
I know I just recently rolled someone a fox I just hope it wasn't you...
White Fox


Lupis (Vallrok)
I rolled the cat family as I so often do so I picked one you already had haha.
Pogeyan


Lupis (Rassaa)
It's so easy just rolling for people's rares.
Madexx (green)


Airwyn
Rare report if you don't mind
Aotona


Belleire
Grey Turtle


Happy hunting

[Lupis]

Yay, my dear friend Pogeyan! Recent tame, but he's so pretty. And green Madexx will be interesting.

I'll get them done when I can. I just need to make another Photobucket account so I can upload more pictures, as my current account is full until March 23.

[Kormai]

Yay, my dear friend Pogeyan! Recent tame, but he's so pretty. And green Madexx will be interesting.

I'll get them done when I can. I just need to make another Photobucket account so I can upload more pictures, as my current account is full until March 23.

So we noticed. Or you could upload them as attachments to your posts and then link to them...like what Cialbi does.

[TygerDarkstorm]

I'm on the party of having to get a second photobucket soon. XD
Which sort of works out for me, have one photobucket for my personal stuff and my photoshop work, and the other for all my screenshots and panels for pet challenges. Making those panels saves me photobucket space too instead of having dozens of screenshots taking up space.

[Lupis]

Mm, that's a good idea. I think I'll start doing that...

[Airwyn]

I absolutely do not mind doing rares and i'll get started on my report soon and it should be posted either today or tomorrow

Still dont have any screenies though so you'll have to bear with my written only

[Kormai]

Time for mah rare reports! (pun not intended...haha my rare reports? cuz i....rarely...do reports? sorry)

Kormai
Ghostcrawler

TL;DR Summary

Where to find: Abandoned Reef, Abyssal Depths, Vashj'ir
Skin Comments: He is a pretty, ghostly crab but he only has 4 legs, which is 2 less than crabs in real life...it's a game, I guess I can't fault them
Animation Comments: Very smooth running, swimming and combat. But could I once have a crab that does the sideways crab walk!?
Pet Specials: Roar of Courage, Str + Agi buff is so very nice (except around DKs, Warriors or Shamans using the Str of Earth totem); Spirit Walk, stealth and dmg buff when entering combat; Spirit Mend, initial heal and HoT...very nice
Pros: He is a Spirit Beast with all that entails; it's a pretty model, nice animations because it's new.
Cons: He is quite see-through, especially when in Beastial Wrath, so his features are pretty non-distinct and he is very glowy (though that makes him pretty too) and his nerfbat when taming hits pretty hard!

Full Review + Fun Stories

Shortly after Cata hit (like the next day) I hit 85 on Kormai, and wondered what pets I should camp for first. Knowing that the longer I waited the more hunters there would be who could tame them and the more people there would be looking for the pets I wanted. I'd pretty much decided before Cata even hit which pets I wanted to tame and on which hunter (Kormai or Kåri). A friend, whom I'd met while camping for Skoll (and who was such good luck, he got me Skoll within 2 hours of the beginning of my search), came to help me with my Ghostcrawler camp because he already had him! I also remember posting in the Ghostcrawler thread about an annoying Nelf hunter who was camping, flagged on top of me (he saw my post and later b!tched me out for it because apparently that's not being threatening at all...nooo). So a few hours after my friend logged off and 5 mins after annoying Nelf went to a BG or logged off, GC popped up, I tamed him and 5 mins after I left Nelfy came back online (an ally friend was monitoring him for me).

Victory! (yeah I already had his name picked out and everything)


Now for the pictures I took the other day...I took him to do my dailies so I could get some action shots for people.

Ocypode vs Gyreworms! He's rather small, but I like him. And that rake animation thing looks cool...except he doesn't have nails...just pincers.




I was actually a bit surprised at his DPS because when I was taking a lot of the screen shots I wasn't helping him kill things and I'd barely get lined up before he'd kiled them. Then again I am BM so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

I took some shots of him at a dummy so I could see his combat animations. He does a swipe with one (pic 1 + 2) and a stab with the other (pic 3). And the last picture is him under Beastial Wrath...hard to see. Here is a composite:


After his "training" I took him for a swim in the river to take some pictures of the animation. It's a cute swim actually, he does a bit of a froggie with his 4 legs and he uses his pincers as paddles. A composite to show the swim:


Overall I quite like the model, animations, his specials (as he is a Spirit Beast) and his DPS. Plus he is hard to kill and there is usually no one around...probably one of the easiest Spirit Beasts to get!

[Cialbi]

Guess who's finally getting his promised report done?
I elected to report on the Spectral Bear; better known as Arcturis.

As a pet family, Spirit Beasts have always taken after Cats. They remain the only pet families that can truly stealth, and also received Roar of Courage, which is probably the most powerful special ability in terms of DPS as far as hunter pets are concerned. However, death knights will, and warriors & shamans can, provide an equivalent buff (the caveat for warriors and shamans is that providing this buff limits what other raid buffs they can provide, so it will depend heavily on spec and raid comp for those classes). But, if you have a Spirit Beast instead of a Cat, then you get an extra benefit; their exotic ability, Spirit Mend. A heal with an almost negligible focus cost that functions like a druid's Regrowth (powerful heal with both instant healing and a HoT), Spirit Mend is easily one of my favorite pet family abilities. The limitation on this ability doesn't come from the strength of the heal, but the length of the cooldown. Overall, Spirit Beasts have truly become more than flashy trophies for hunters. I honestly just wish that another Spirit Beast skin would be developed for a new named mob that isn't a rarespawn, but that's another topic.
_

Arcturis is a rarespawn found in Grizzly Hills, and only has one spawn point and an exceptionally lengthy spawn timer. It's worth noting that Arcturis does not count towards the Northern Exposure or Frostbitten achievements; the beast was implemented after those achievements. If someone is arguing otherwise and wants to kill Arcturis, then they need to re-read their achievement criteria.

I shall include my taming story, since it's more interesting than how I got Grubthor (multiple flybys, one day Grubthor set off _NPCScan, I tamed Grubthor... very anticlimatic story). Late one night (it may have already been the early morning) I was questing in Grizzly Hills, working my way towards the Grizzled Veteran achievement. Why I was doing this, I couldn't tell you; I don't remember having much of any reason for doing so. This was back in patch 3.3 when we still had a maximum of 5 pets, and Call Stabled Pet, but anyone who kept up on the news from the Cataclysm beta knew that the stable system was going to change. I, like many other hunters, had a full stable.
As it turned out, I wasn't alone that night. Some random priest, who happened to be leveling through Grizzly Hills at the time, announced on the general channel that Arcturis was up. I...didn't know what to do. I use Call Stabled Pet, and take a look. Eranugarr; no, that's my raiding wolf. Hooch; no, that's The Beast, and I'm not going to try and retame that puppy. Cyfaillid; no, that's the Silithid Ravager, and will probably no longer be tamable once my stables expand (I wasn't particularly well-informed with Cataclysm news at the time). So, that leaves me with Fonlithien (Ghamoo-ra) and Argolak (Rotting Agam'ar) as the pets I can afford to abandon. Since Fonlithien is my soloing pet, and I do a lot of soloing, that leaves me with Argolak. So, I pick Argolak and close the stables window, and respond on the general channel. I quickly get invited to a group, and flew over to the priest's location. Abandon Pet, Freezing Arrow, Tame Beast; the tame itself was uneventful. I then proceeded to spend the next half hour or so running around, zapping critters with Spirit Strike, and then using Eyes of the Beast to run around and zap flagged NPCs with Spirit Strike. I later named him Aquind, after my brother's first character (a druid) that he had deleted at some point because neither of us knew how to drop professions. Maybe Aquind had gone off to help with Vordrassil, then some terrible accident occurred that left part of him roaming Grizzly Hills as a feral spirit? At any rate, Aquind has since been with Cialbi through a lot, becoming one of Cialbi's key pets even after his stables were expanded. I doubt that Cialbi will ever tame another Spirit Beast, because he will always be relying upon Aquind.
_

Arcturis has a very unique model. It has the same skeleton as tamable bears, but not quite the same model. Arcturis is based off the following model:

But, Arcturis isn't merely a ghostly version of this model; there are other details that aren't on the above base model. First off, Arcturis has a horse mane.

It's kinda pixellated, but at least it doesn't look as obviously 2D as the horse manes on many other beasts. Second, the less opaque parts of Arcturis actually have a very neat texture, reminiscent of light refracting through the rippling surface of water.

I honestly never noticed this before I undertook this pet challenge. If you look closely at Kormai's signature, you can see the same effect playing on Arcturis in that image. However, I should point out that this is a static feature; these lines won't move if you keep the camera (and bear) in one spot. The third feature that distinguishes Arcturis from the base model would be the 'spectral smoke'.

It will be visible in many of the other screenshots that I'll post. The spectral smoke will emanate from somewhere between Arcturis's shoulderblades, and lazily drift upward as it fades out of existence. These wisps of spectral smoke will otherwise be stationary; when running, Arcturis will leave a breadcrumb trail of spectral smoke. Interestingly enough, spectral smoke isn't unique to Arcturis; Gondria will emit the stuff as well. The following screenshot is of Cialbi and Aquind with a friend of mine, shortly after taming Gondria.

Aquind and Amethyst, the kindred spirits.
_

I may love Aquind to death, but ever since taming him I've found the flaws with the model to be painfully obvious. In short, here is what I am talking about:

Not only can you see the mouth when looking at Arcturis from behind, you also get a pretty horrible view of the model. All those clashing lines don't really make me think 'bear' so much as 'fail'. Frankly, it looks horrid, and appalled me when Arcturis first ran to my side as my pet spirit beast. But, that first glimpse of Pixel-Ass Bear didn't last long, as my new spirit beast did what any newly tamed cat will do; enter Prowl (Spirit Beasts have since had their ability renamed Spirit Walk, but that's a purely aesthetic change).

So much better - but so much slower. I then chose Boar's Speed when talenting my new pet, a talent that I almost never use, and ever since Aquind has spent most of his time Spirit Walking. I think he actually prefers that. Over time, I've been bothered less and less by the downside of having a half see-through bear, and now accept Aquind for what he is. He still looks much nicer imo when he does the Spirit Walk, though.
_

Some pets don't show the same as the hunter when Camouflage is active; glows and effects failing to get muted is typical. Some beasts (typically the 'ghostly' pet models) won't render properly and become completely invisible. With Arcturis, this is true of every part of that bear save that grin.

I refer to Arcturis under Camouflage as the 'Cheshire Bear' (Click on the image below).


Oh, and final pic is just for the 's

I believe that Frankie gave my cockatiel some ideas, and he wasn't to be outdone by some flightless bird. Poor Aquind.
_

Well, I went ahead and renewed my account for one more month before hunkering down until the family's financial situation improves. Who knows, I may get lucky and land a paid internship next school year. Anyways, I'm not quite ready to ask for another random assignment just yet. Maybe later this week.

[Airwyn]

Ok so my report was on Aotona! http://www.wow-petopia.com/look/parrotskinblue.html
Aotona is a level 75 rare elite that can be found in various parts of the Wild Growth Mangal in Sholazar Basin!

She is a bird of prey and so has the Snatch ability which disarms the target for 10 seconds.

Her diet consists of meat and fish so a pretty easy pet to feed.

She is a parrot and is not very quiet and she has the wing flapping, so if you dont like loud pets or ones that flap their wings then this is not the pet for you
Other than that, her animations are nice and smooth for swimming, her flying and combat. She is a cunning pet but she does hold aggro pretty well if you misdirect to her. I'm not huge in pvp but i'm sure with the Snatch ability she'd be a pretty nice pet to take. Her damage output is good and when I take her to do dailies things get killed fast

Aotona is the only parrot with this skin and so she's not only beautiful but unique! Though she can certainly be tough to find with the spawn points being in a questing area, next to the Oracles, and she is also a part of the Frostbitten achievement. So finding and taming this pet would be tough, I dont see hardly any hunters with her on my server!

That was fun! Hope it was sufficient even without the screenies

[Kormai]

Airwyn: Nice report, thank you. And I don't see hunters on my server with her either. For that matter I don't think I've ever seen her, tamed or in the wild.

Time for my next report!

Kåri
Jadefang

TL;DR Summary
Where to find: Crumbling Depths cave, Deepholm

Skin Comments: She is one of the new Shale Spiders, the only model you can get in green. Seemingly made completely out of pieces of rock somehow held together. It's quite cute, with its crystals for eyes and the little "fangs." The body has some nice rock-ish textures.

Animation Comments: She has a cute idle animation of looking side to side, but she has to move her whole body to do that. In combat she lunges with her fangs and also swipes with a leg. The swimming animation is smooth and very much like the crab without pincers (see my Ghostcrawler report a few posts up).

Pet Sounds: While idle I don't think she makes any noise...at least I don't remember it. In combat, however, she is *very* loud. Tanks might hate you if you use it in a dungeon/raid. That being said I love her squee sound, personally, but I know that it's sort of a love/hate thing. I think it's cute...some think it sounds like nails on a chalkboard. My recommendation is to tame a common one first to see if you can stand the noise.

Pet Specials: Web Wrap, the new ability added recently that will stun the target for 3 seconds (good for PvP and soloing for sure); Embrace of the Shale Spider, 5% Str, Agi, Stam + Int buff + magical resistances...equivalent to Paladin's Blessing of Kings and Druid's Mark of the Wild

Pros: Pretty model and colour and if you like the sounds...cute sounds haha. The buff is usually very appreciated if you are missing a Paladin or a Druid. Also Jadefang only has one spawn point so she is easy to camp, even without a rare finder addon.

Cons: It's hard to get into the cave if you don't have the daily quest or a nice friend who has it. She also drops a mini-pet of herself if you kill her, so non-BM hunters and non-hunters will camp her as well. Usually they are nice enough to hunters who wish to tame but as I have experienced (after I tamed her thankfully) there are people who are dicks.

How I Got Into The Cave
So when I was leveling in Deepholm on Kåri (at that point I'd already leveled Kormai to 85 and done all of deepholm) I hit 83 before I was done all the quests. I decided to drop the quests and move on to Uldum...bad idea! When I came back later to complete the quests to get the daily I couldn't find where I left off. I used wowhead and wowpedia to go through all the quest chains, went to all the quest givers in the chains and no one had any quests. I put in a ticket and they said "Thank you for contacting us, this is a known issue that we are working to resolve." I other words: Yeah we know and we'll fix it eventually. I'm guessing I was phased from a quest giver or something because 3 months later...about a week and a half ago...I did the process again and finally found a quest where there hadn't been one before.

So in the meantime I camped for other rares first, hoping they would fix my issue, until one day a friend of mine linked the Tiny Shale Spider pet and I asked him how he got up there...he said he used the bomb from the daily and if I wanted he could blast me up there so I could camp. I just couldn't leave!

I think they have fixed the Night Elf wisp method of getting up there...if not, if you are a Night Elf you can die just under the ledge and then fly up and resurrect inside Jadefang's cave. Another way is to do some fancy disconnecting and reconnecting of your internet cable, tricking it to not kick you off your flying mount and let you land inside Jadefang's cave. If you are a hunter and an engineer you can try getting your rocket boots to malfunction while being attacked, rocketing you in the air and then Disengage into the cave. Or you can get a friend, like I did, to blast you up...or if you can get the daily that is the easiest way, and blast yourself!

The Wait and the Tame
Now that I got up there and couldn't leave, I prayed to P.Dawg for my Shale Spider. During my camping, late into the night, a fellow hunter in my guild blasted himself up into the cave...traded me a Chocolate Cookie and ran off again. So cute Also note that this was after my paid race change to Worgen and before I begged them to change me back...she is not the same

All hail the mightly P. Dawg!

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Awww he gave me a cookie!

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I went to bed and got up the next day and camped most of the next afternoon and evening until 23 hours almost on the dot since my friend killed her, she spawned just for me to tame. After, I thanked P. Dawg

Taming!

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Thank you P. Dawg!

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Now that Kåri is a Draenei again (YAY!) here is her and her beloved pet:

Kari (as a Draenei) and Mara (get it? Mara Jade?....Jadefang?)

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Combat/Animations
I used to have her speced for tanking but I decided I might need her in dungeons so I thought I should try a DPS spec...man was I surprised. When speced for completely DPS she actually has some nice damage! And when I had her speced as a tank, she held aggro like a champ and rarely needed me to heal her.

For the challenge I went to take some screen shots of my pretty Mara in combat in Tol Barad. The first one shows a good example of her Web Wrap ability and how it looks. The second shows what she looks like during Beastial Wrath...nice big Shale Spider. And the third, I needed to kill Problim, which we did without a...problem...ha ha ha...

Web Wrap demostration.

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Beastial Wrath :)

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Not a Problim...

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I also took her to a training dummy to get some shots of her attack animations. The fang/lunge thing came out well; I was unable to get a good shot of her leg swipe thing. There is also a close up of Jadefang as a whole.

Combat composite.

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And lastly, I took her swimming to see what it looked like...and to give her a bath after her day of hard work!

Swimming in Stormwind.

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Overall, I love my Jadefang (and baby Jadefang... ). The colour is pretty, the animations are smooth and I love her squee!

[TygerDarkstorm]

All righty. Sorry this took so long; I think between doing a bunch of these and the theme pet challenge, I burnt myself out.

Here's Venjin's report on .

For the Horde, these little guys can only be tamed in EPL, and they roam quite a few areas in it. Alliance hunters can tame them from Howling Fjord as well as EPL.


Looks:

This guy matches surprisingly well with Venjin's new hair color. His body is a dark, base green with bright green runes, yellow eyes, and a yellowish-white mane. His feet are a glowing bluish-white. I really want to like these guys, but the models have so many issues and I'm not fond of their special so I usually feel pretty meh about them.

Now strangely, even though these guys are dogs, their bodies are covered in scales instead of fur (second from the top). Their back legs also look way too skinny to support their bodies (top middle).

The demon dogs are very muscular little guys, and as a weird counterpart to their back legs being too skinny, their front legs look far too muscular (second from top right). Their tails are also weirdly the same color as their manes (top right).

From the front, I just think these guys look strange (bottom left). Their eyes are a sickly yellow color, with no pupil. Their faces almost look too reptilian for me...it's kind of creepy.

Even though the runed demon dogs are newer than the others, they still look just as terrible. Their horns and ears just look flat and 2-D and then there's the goofy, painted on and paper thin mane (bottom right).

Animations and Sounds:

Demon dogs don't have much in the way of basic animations. They only do one idle, dubbed "the puppy hop," that presents us with a "can't unsee" effect (top left). For some reason, Blizzard made it so that when these guys open their mouths, they don't open properly and almost look as if their jaws are dislocating.

Their run is at least cute as they look sort of like they're leaping and bounding across the ground (top right). They have no swim animation and instead just do a really fast walk through the water (bottom). One other kind of neat thing about these guys is the demonic growling sounds they make in combat.

Combat:

What dogs lack in basic animations, they make up for in combat animations--sort of. They have three attack animations, the right paw swipe (top middle), the jump and bite (top right), and the duck and bite (middle left). The bottom two photos showcase the two stages of Lock Jaw, the left side being the dog beginning the cast, and the right being the channel--the dog just stands there doing nothing as it channels Lock Jaw.

Being ferocity pets, these guys will do decent damage. Their special ability is Lock Jaw, a channeled snare/root. This thing is just a big pain in the butt to me, and is a terrible ability to leave on autocast as a BM hunter. Kill Command will override your dog's channel, thus letting the mob (or player) get free. Cialbi found use for this ability and Pin as a SV hunter, just be warned that your pet will create no aggro whatsoever while channeling Pin or Lock Jaw. While this ability has its uses in PvE (mostly while soloing), it does seem to be more of a PvP ability to help keep pesky melee or fleeing casters under control.

I apologize again for that taking so long. I still have to finish up my theme challenge panels and reports so I'll probably be taking a break from this for a little while. Oh, and Rockefeller isn't staying with Venjin, I just really don't like demon dogs.

[Kormai]

I don't blame you for not liking the demon dog...I don't like the dogs in general. Don't like the demon dogs and I haaaaate the mastiffs....none of my hunters have dogs except maybe my Worgen on Nesingwary. Even then I think I may have gotten rid of it.

[Lupis]

Two reports for you! Green Madexx first, then Pogeyan.

Madexx TL;DR

What and Where: Rare Spawn random color Scorpion, level 84, Uldum.

Appearance: A very pretty yellow-green with yellow scales, blue highlights and purple venom. Uses the new Scorpid model.

Animations: Smooth and simple, very cute.

Sounds: Typical Scorpid screeches, some high pitched, others lower.

Battle: Tenacity, mostly a tank. Can be used for DPS, but it isn't optimal. Has a Disarm that's very good for PvP and PvE.

Long Version

Green Madexx was the second Madexx I tamed, and I've had the hardest time naming him - though I think I inadvertently named him while doing this report. Link. Get it? Green? Yeah, I'm stupid.

Model and Skin



Look how pretty this format is! ...Right, Madexx. Model wise, I can't find a single problem. He's very well made and extremely detailed. A notable difference between him and his regular scorpid friends is that his claws are thin and sharp, while theirs are thicker and rounder.
If you look close at the second picture (Top middle), you'll see that his mouth is purple, just like his stinger. He has very bright orange-red eyes and lovely light blue/green ridges.
I'm always amazed by how detailed and high res this model is.

Animations



He has one idle animation, a now-famous happy claw wave. He looks adorable! While idle and not waving his claws, his feelers constantly wave back and forth and he bobs about. (1 and 2)
TA-DA! It's GREEN MADEXX here with OXYCLEAN! (3)
...Sorry. I had to.
His run animation I didn't get a picture of, but it isn't that exciting, though very smooth. He simply skitters forward, legs working quickly. Very nice.
As for swimming, he's both adorable and creepy. A report above me by Daranara has a little animation of it. If you pay close attention to his legs, though... Erghhh. *Shudders* They stick way out, all thin and fragile, just ready to fall off in your hand. Gross...
Attacking he's got very simple, and a bit disappointing, animations. He snaps at the enemy with a claw, using one claw per attack. He never uses his vicious looking stinger at all.

In battle, he's a very good tank, and quite good DPS if you spec him right. As tenacity, he has the golden tanking ability - Thunderstomp. He's quite tough and his ability, Clench, lets him disarm the enemy of both the mainhand and the ranged weapon for 10 seconds. This keeps him healthy in PvE and really ticks people off in PvP.

Overall, he's not my favorite of the Madexx colors, but I still think he's awfully pretty. I've got to admit that this report made me love him a bit more, too, and of course it helped me name him. ^.^

Pogeyan in the next post.